


The True Meaning of Evil

by SumDumMuffin



Series: Absolute Hoodwitch Armageddon [4]
Category: RWBY
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Alternate Universe - Villains, F/F, Humor
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-21
Updated: 2019-11-21
Packaged: 2021-01-30 22:31:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,080
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21435757
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SumDumMuffin/pseuds/SumDumMuffin
Summary: Evil science wizard Glynda Goodwitch gets a new lab assistant.
Relationships: Glynda Goodwitch/Ruby Rose
Series: Absolute Hoodwitch Armageddon [4]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1616476
Comments: 4
Kudos: 22





	The True Meaning of Evil

**Author's Note:**

> This one's, a little more out-there, as far as premises and setting go. These are all intended to be one-shots so I only try to obliquely reference random lore that doesn't exactly matter, but this setting might suggest there's a lot of that.

"Muhahahaa- <cough>," Evil mad scientist Glynda Goodwitch sputtered. She doubled over, coughing, for a few moments. "- no, see, I can't do it."

"Maybe like, a sinister witch's cackle would suit you more?" Said the death knight recently assigned to her. She slung her impractically spikey scythe over her shoulders as she leaned against a large barrel of green liquid. "You know, considering your namesake...." 

"It's an ironic namesake," Glynda said. She frowned. "Besides, is it really necessary to learn how to do an evil laugh?"

"Sure it is!" The death knight pouted. "It's branding!" 

Glynda turned back towards her magical reagents. "The previous Night King didn't care about 'branding', He just wanted to blow up all those stupid elves." 

"Well, Night King Blake still wants to blow up all those stupid elves," said the death knight, "But she _also_ knows that your image is a way of taking control over how other people see you! That how you present yourself is power and your image is in taking control of that power." 

"And," the death knight continued, "She's willing to fund your latest endeavor. So can you at least try to get a proper evil laugh down?" 

"Well I thought she was interested in my latest research," Glynda mumbled, slightly miffed.

"What was that called again?" The death knight interrupted. 

Glynda frowned. "You didn't pay attention during your orientation?" 

"Nah," the death knight waved the air, "Cuz, I'm also Chaotic." 

"It's 'unclear'." 

"It's not clear what it is?" 

"No, i'm calling it Unclear," Glynda said. "Because it, like you, deals with the forces of chaos, but the most chaotic reaction is an explosion. An 'Unclear' explosion." 

"Ooooh," The death knight pointed finger guns at Glynda."And is it also literally unclear? like, that its hard to see through?"

"By definition, most explosions would not be transparent, because of the debris and the plasma and what not." 

"So, that's a yes?" 

Glynda sighed. "Sure, if it'll get you to actually start helping me?"

"But I am helping you!" the death knight said, "Try laughing from your diaphragm-"

"How about," Glynda said. She walked over to her protective face gear, "You help me with the actual science that I assumed you were familiar with when I first agreed to letting you help me." 

"Nah, I'm not too good with machines," the death knight said. She nodded her head. "Only machine I know how to use is gravity." She started to pick up the barrel of goo-

"Why don't-," Glynda rushed over to place her hand on the Knight's, to set the barrel back on a stable surface, "You just, go turn on the generator downstairs. And then, I'll give the laugh another go." 

That seemed to appease the knight. 

  
It turned out, the death knight's name was Ruby. It figured, since, red was a big part of her color scheme.

And by the end of the night, Glynda had a finished prototype of her unclear bomb, a newly organized lab area, and a passable evil laugh. 

Over the next period of time required to finalized research on and development of an evil super-weapon, and subsequently implement an evil plan based around detonating it, 

Ruby came to be a regular fixture of Glynda's lab and a valuable asset in the administration of her evil lab. Passable lab assistant, but you can't have it all. 

It was nice to have someone around, in case Glynda needed help to move heavy equipment or the corpses of errant low-level adventurers who'd accidentally stumbled into her labspace, or if one of her experiments gained sentience and needed someone with a familiarity with philosophy to give it an existential grasp of purpose.

  
During the pre-mission commemorative evil ball, Glynda was invited to schmooze and do whatever it was the evil people in charge did for entertainment. Gloat and kick puppies and whatever. 

"I admit," Glynda said, in the corner of the sanctum, "I feel a little out of place here." 

She had her nicest lab coat on. Meaning that it didn't even have any chemical burns or potion stains on it; it was clearly never used for its true purpose. What a waste. 

"Nah, you shouldn't!" Ruby said. She had agreed to continue her assistant duties during the ball, which mostly entailed following Glynda around to bail her out in case some boring evil countess tried talking to her.

"If you wanted to be evil while pretending not to be, you'd just be, like, an abusive parent, or a robber baron," Ruby said. "The puppy kicking and evil gloating and petty mistreatment of our enslaved elf prisoners is important to the nature of what being evil is." To demonstrate the latter, Ruby slapped a tray of hors d'oeuvres out of the hands of one of the enslaved elf prisoners.

Glynda scrunched her mouth to the side. "It mostly just feels like the Night King is practicing for when she end up taking over all the stupid elves." 

"That too." Ruby picked one of the fancy cookies off the floor, since she actually was feeling snacky. 

Glynda nodded, but din't think of anything else to say. 

Ruby coughed. "Tell you what," She pointed finger guns at Glynda, "Why don't you show off your evil laugh to some of the evil nobility, while I go get some blood wine and possibly schmooze with some cute executioner." 

Glynda scrunched her mouth to the side. 

Later, the Night King gave a toast and a speech about how all the stupid elves were fundamentally incompatible with their dark, evil culture, and also the standard stuff about being in a new era of global supremacy and her grand designs for internal evil reform as well as world conquest, yadda yadda. 

  
"Alright, I've set the minions started on digging the final chamber- DAMMIT JAUNE!" Ruby yelled at the relevant minion. Jaune scrambled to pick up the unclear orbs rolling around the tunnel floor before any of them randomly exploded. 

They were all deep underground in a recently wrought and hastily reinforced tunnel, with magical glow crystals strapped to their helmets to provide enough light to see by. Because while they were the Night Empire, most of them still couldn't naturally see in the night. 

"How has Jaune not been fired yet?" Glynda mused, idly. 

"It's actually really important for every evil team to have a Jaune." Ruby gestured with her hands. "Because when things go wrong or the heroes show up unexpectedly- especially in the middle of an evil one-liner from one of us- we can just blame it all on Jaune, then get started on the next mission."

"Well, consider that one more change I'm going to make," Glynda said. "There should be _no_ opportunity for heroes to unexpectedly show up at all, even if we're saying particularly evil one-liners." Glynda nodded. "We're digging this tunnel as deep as we can, and there'll be no incidental raiding, magical summoning, or anything else that could give us away." 

Glynda glanced at the wall and rubbed the back of her head. "And, ah, that means you can laugh evilly as loud as you want. There'll be enough distance between us and any stupid elves to be out of range of any magical detection, too."

"Aww, you did that for me?" Ruby said. She winked. 

"Go crazy." 

Ruby smiled across her entire face and she threw her head back and gestured widely with her hands. "Muwahahahaha!" 

  
And then it was the moment of truth.

Since they couldn't risk checking visually, Glynda had just mathematically determined how long the tunnel had to be in which direction, in order to be directly under Snow Queen Schnee's ice palace, the seat of power for all the stupid elves. 

All her equipment was in place, and ready to function. 

Glynda took a breath.

"Alright, whats the ETA to detonation?" Ruby asked. 

"About 5 minutes." 

"Oof, so we should probably get going, then-" Ruby said. "We might need to leave behind some servants," She then chuckled in glee. "Or maybe even Jaune, if he doofs up again." 

"Oh, then I'll delay it," Glynda said, "No sense wasting servants. Wasting Jaune would be fine, though, if it were just him." 

Ruby chuckled at that, but her mood faded after a moment. 

"So, are you," Ruby said. She gestured at the equipment. "Going to switch some sort of timer, or..."

"Oh, no," Glynda said. "I'm the timer." 

Ruby blinked. "What?"

"While the unclear power orbs can just, be thrown, to get an ideal unclear reaction, the timing has to be very precise," Glynda said, "So I'm going to do it manually." 

Ruby blinked again. She opened and closed her mouth. "So you're, going to, blow yourself up, with the bomb?"

"It's fitting, don't you think?" Glynda said, "That I was here for the creation of this technology, and I will end with it." 

"And you," Ruby furrowed her brow, "intend it to end with you?" 

"The research notes are all properly annotated for my eventual successor," Glynda said, "And smaller versions of such are ready for larger scale production. But the actual bomb is going to need a very precise detonation sequence, which will need me to do it." 

"But the _empire_ needs you!" 

"Well, I don't matter specifically-"

"Sure you do!" Ruby said. Her voice wavered. She took a step, and she clasped Glynda's hand in her own. "And you have so much to offer, to mad science, to the world, and to the people around you."

Glynda felt her cheeks heat up for some reason. She coughed. 

"Well, the initial preparations have already begun," Glynda said. She adjusted her glasses, "So, someone has to stay behind to finish it up-"

"Lets rig up something to do it automatically," Ruby said. 

"I don't have any of my tools, or spare machines-" 

"Well why don't we use the simplest machine of all;" Ruby said. She picked up a barrel and turned it on its side, "Gravity. "

"That's not a mach-"

"Gravity will knock the catalyst into the oxidizer to begin the process." 

"You-" Glynda parsed, "were listening to me..."

And whatever form of gratitude or flattery Glynda was going to express left her, because Ruby then scooped her up in her arms and started barreling down the tunnel. 

Glynda was about to protest, at first for the indignity, and then for logistical concerns, but then, it turned out to be rather nice, carried in a cute girl's arms while she was steadfastly determined to save her life. 

And it was also nice to not be exploded. 

And after they (Well, Ruby) had successfully outrun the explosion, Ruby fell to her knees and placed Glynda on the tunnel floor. 

"Aight, you are, actually a good 10 inches taller than me," Ruby panted, "And also a lot heavier than you look." 

"Excuse me," Glynda said, frim the ground, with pretend indignance. 

Ruby lay on her back with her limbs spread out as she continued to breath heavily. 

"Thank you," Glynda said. She rubbed the back of her head. 

"Aw, don't mention it," Ruby said. "Seriously; not having to talk about feelings is one perk of being evil." 

"And- ah," Glynda said, involuntarily, as a cackle escaped her lips. "Aha. Ahahhehe." 

"Hey, your evil laugh is getting better," Ruby said, between breaths.

"Aheh- It's just- without proper calibration, there's no way the explosion blew up the whole city," Glynda said. "So all of this work was for nothing. Ahhaha...." 

Ruby stood up and stretched. She reached a hand out towards Glynda. "I guess we'll have to keep trying, then." 

"Will you still be my assistant?" Glynda took the hand. 

"Of course," Ruby said. She pulled Glynda to her feet, and Glynda brushed herself off and nodded. They exited the tunnel, side by side. 

And when they got to the surface, Jaune informed them that the tunnel hadn't been below the stupid elf palace at all. They only blew up some civilian and industrial quarters. Which was still a bonus, but not what they set out to do.

"What?" Glynda said. She pulled out her notes, "I double checked the math based on our stolen layout of their city." 

Ruby glanced to the side of (because she was too short to glance over) Glynda's shoulder. 

"Oooh, I see what the problem is," Ruby said. She pointed to the relevant error in Glynda's calculations. "All the stupid elves are fundamentally incompatible with our culture. They use the metric system." 


End file.
